Sriphanomthorn is Thailand’s Golden Girl

Benjaporn Sriphanomthorn emerged as Thailand’s top performing female athlete on Day 2 of the swimming competition at the OCBC Aquatic Centre by winning two gold medals.

Sriphanomthorn won the Women’s 800m freestyle. In the final race of the day, she anchored the Women’s 4 x 200m freestyle team in a spectacular race to claim gold.

“I am very glad, I have been practising very hard and we have a coach from Australia who really helped in training and helped me to improve my time,” said Sriphanomthorn.

On the comeback victory in the relay, where Thailand were trailing Indonesia going into the last leg, the Chulalongkorn University undergraduate simply declared that she “tried my best for the team and for my Thai people”.

A year ago at the 2015 Southeast Asian Games held in Singapore, Sriphanomthorn bagged a bronze in the 800m free, and two silvers in the 4 x 100m and 4 x 200m relays. She was relieved to finally win gold in Singapore.

Sriphanomthorn’s ultimate goal will be to qualify for Olympics 2020, where the 21-year-old is poised to lead Thailand’s medal quest.